Do you know what I hate most about my neurotic nature? I actually don't even know if it can be called neurosis. It drives me to exhaustion though, that is a fact. Please leave me a comment as this post is no wall of graffitti to stare at, no not this time. I don't care what your response is as long as you have one. If you have time to read this them you have time to respond with some care. Do you feel that sense of desperation yet? Good, then we are on the same page.
Right before I wrote, Right before, I remembered something important about this very topic I am about to discuss. It is not the thing that bothers me but is another example all together. Maybe you will connect with one or both. Maybe not. God help us.
When I was a younger, teenage kid I once (and that is in the literal sense) was allowed to spend the night at my best friends house. The weekend was great - I had fun - skipping to the important part. So we are in his room at night. We are talking about what every 13 year old boy talks about at 1:30 in the morning. Girls. The days activities had taken a toll on my friend who lay on his twin bed in front of me. He was starting to doze off before me and I sat there wishing either A) That he would wake up and talk some more or B) I would fall asleep too. He then surprised me. His arm spasmed and hit him right in the eye. It looked funny to me and it woke him too so I was guilty of being happy on two counts. He asked what I was laughing at and I explained. He told me it happens to him all the time right before he falls asleep. I was concerned with this unknown yet common fact. I hadn't ever recalled this happening to me before. I don't remember seeing someone do it before this night at my best friends house. I tell him my side of it all and he thinks I am a strange one. I let him fall asleep again. He twitches at least twice that I notice. I close my eyes and enjoy the cool breeze coming in through the open window nearby. Itis a typical Florida summer night - humid as hell and filled with competing song of cricket, frog and the occasional owl. My best friends parents don't believe in running the air conditioner at night, or wearing clothes in the swimming pool for that matter, and I don't mind one bit. I am out of the prison yard finally doing what normal teenagers do on their summer breaks from school. There is nothing I won't accept or frown upon while I am here. I am lying there on a borrowed sleeping bag listening to the Florida night, my friends heavy breathing and Black Sabbath playing at that perfect lulling volume. I close my eyes and you wouldn't believe what happens. My leg spasms and knocks my knees together. Not 10 minutes since I declared ignorance to my friend! I searched my memory as far back as I could wanting to find a time that this has occured before tonight. Nothing was there. Of course now, more than double that lifetime ago, I occasionally do it while falling asleep. It is not common but it happens. No big deal.
This has to be *the longest prolouge to the shortest story ever written. I am backwards like that so get used to it. Or, as my friend would say " Fuck'em if they can't take a joke". She makes me smile. I am not sure if it is the bastard in me that loves the phrase or if it is the whole nostagia of it all. I just love it. Reconsidering that this is the *T.L.P.T.T.S.S.E.W., I felt a bit bad for you. I even considered filling inbetween the lines for you just this once. I want you to know that I never write for you. I strongly considered fluffing it out and entertaining a bit but I only write what comes out of my head so unfortunately there will be no subplot, hero, villian or dreamlike sequence flash back nude scene. I love you to death, I really do, but I can't muddy the water with commercials. You either buy it or you don't & either way you are gonna get mud on your face.
Everyone laugh. Wait for it. Okay now.
When I was a young boy, my father, took me to the city, to see a marching band. No that is not my story. When I was younger, say, 5 years ago maybe I found out that my biological father (aka: Mr. No Show, Serial Sense of Self Killer, Some Random Dude) died years before. He was a retired airforce something or another. It doesn't matter. He was walking out of a 7-11 and fell over dead in the parking lot before he could get back in his truck. I probably saw this one liner story on the news that night never knowing it was him. Do you recognize someone you have never seen before? Sometimes, I suppose. None the less it happened. This news led to other events in questioning medical history, yaddah yaddah yaddah. I was told he had high blood pressure ( which I never have had luckily) and that he had been in decent shape except for a pot belly (note to self: do more crunches!). It is funny how being a bastard son doesn't come with a severance package or gold watch but you will get a free cheery medical history report right away. All of this new info is neutral to me. That is, until I am told one last thing. "Your father has sleep apnea but it was probably due to his being overweight. Nothing for you to worry about." Ok I won't. Simple as that. But I do. I go to sleep that night thinking of it. I discuss it with my wife and she comforts me a little. She always had a way of making me feel better; seeing that silver lining. I think that was one of the qualities I loved best about her. Still, I let my own monster take over and I pretent to be at ease for my Little Mrs Sunshines sake.
In my mind I think about lying breathless as I sleep imitating the perfect movie stiff. Has this been happening all my life? Would I know since it happens while you are sleeping? Since that night, 5 odd years ago, I have thought of my breathing compulsively. I think of it when I am watching television, I think of it when I am inhaling fresh air, I think of it when I am taking a shower, I think of it when I am having sex. I always think of it. I think of my breathing and heartrate. Well, breathing monster meets heartrate monster, monsters fall in love, monsters move in together, monsters get married. Naturally. Thinking of my breathing wouldn't be an issue but I have lied to you sort of. I dont just think about it. I control it. I control my involuntary actions. Next I will be force blinking and sneezing like a perfect nutcase. Do you remember that roach-alien-guy that played in Men in Black? That will be me. Completely jerky and noncompliant. What a riot I will be.
Last month I found myself in the emergency room (minor lobotomy, no worries). I was hooked up to a breathing and heartrate monitor for several hours. The rise and fall of my diaphragm(sp) was recorded onto a little screen for my viewing pleasure. I stared at this readout for hours. I tried every combination of breaths. Breathing shallow, breathing deep, not breathing, a mixture of all three. This also affected my heartrate in more subtle ways. I was a kid lost in Toys R Us. I couldn't take the monitors home and that is definitely a good thing now that I look back on it. All fun aside though, it bothers me. I can not escape this obsessive compulsiveness of doom. Does it make me crazier or does it make me sane? I don't know how it works but I hate it. I don't want to have to think about things I don't have to think of. I recognize someone I have never seen before and I hate his fucking guts.
March 17th, 2007
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